It wasn't my imagination that I had a scratchy throat. Today I stayed home in bed with a mild fever, very scratchy throat and stuffed head (was that blood in my sinuses? yep, it was). Slept mostly.

So, week 2 of 8 in a client course and I had my first sick day. I am trying very hard not to see it as an omen. The clients only asked if I had a headache, and were surprisingly reassured to hear it was just a snotty head cold.

You know you're sick when bed feels like the only possible place to be, and sitting up to watch Life on TV - after a day in bed - makes you all hot and squirley again. On a side note, it is just wrong how much I love that show. I feel uncomfortable about how much I love it. The brightest, shiniest, most looked-foreward to thing in my life should not be a television show... I don't even need anything to happen, just the actors to be on screen talking about nothing, with the lovely camera work.

The news brought me crashing down. The reportage about the fires and their aftermath is starting to make me feel a bit ick and voyeuristic. At this point we should decently turn away our gaze unless the victims ask us in. And even if they do, I wonder if they will still feel like this in a few weeks' time. It all reminds me a bit of being in a major road accident, even if that was nearly 20 years ago. When you're raw at the beginning, you don't really care, but later... Channel 10 was interviewing children for goodness' sake and that is just WRONG.

And I don't get the weather, even though I'm very grateful personally. It's down to 17'C in my house, colder outside. Feels like mid-March, not mid-Feb. My plants are nearly as confused as I am.

Sleep well, and try to have pleasant dreams. The fire aftermath will be with us for some time, you don't want to get compassion overload.

Leftover stew cooked by Hubby for dinner. Yum. He wishes he cooked more. There's still mashed vegies in the fridge for tomorrow night, too. Hubby was feeling very domestic on Sunday evening.

Went to see Crusher today (was supposed to be yesterday but I was non-compis). Did a fairly energetic workout and didn't keel over. Felt optimistic about that. Wasn't able to go to physio yesterday so it will take about a fortnight to get back into the system. Bugger. Crusher made sure I worked my lattisimus dorsi and my sub-scapulans enough for any physio's satisfaction.

As I have failed to attend 4 of the last 5 Monday mornings, I've changed by personal training session to 1 hour on Friday morning. I promised that I would go to the gym 'solo' one other day (either Mon or Tue, depending which one I was upright for). So instead of doing legs one day and upper body the other, I will do it all on Fridays. It will be interesting to see if I still get a weekend migraine when I do that. I am expecting the migraines to get temporarily worse when I change my routine that much, but hey, I could be pleasantly surprised.

My ears hurt today from using the noise-cancelling headphones for most of the previous 3 days. But I don't have a migraine today so its not all bad.

Had a coffee at the Cafe that I was going to work for. Notice the past tense there. Had a good chat with the Manager, but the job will not be going ahead in the forseeable future. Nothing to do with me, I hasten to add.

Not having to keep free Mon/Tue afternoons does free up my schedule a bit. I could get further clients. Or more realistically I could do a couple of short courses I wanted to do, and look around for a Hobby Job somewhere else. Something low stress that involves looking after people, either feeding them (hence cafe) or dressing them. My favourite clothing boutique is not currently hiring and I have ZERO interest in just whatever high street chain. But somewhere I could do my Shopping Fairy mojo and get paid for it? that would work.

Seem to be getting a head cold so feeling a bit victimized on that front. Scratchy throat, and sore eye sockets sounds like sinus to me. Sigh.

Also, I've lost a client. It is in the nature of clients to leave from time to time, but this wasn't one I expected. I am worrying about it a bit. Did I misunderstand? Was there something I could have done differently? Were we just incompatible from the start but didn't realise it?

Feeling very down about the bushfires. I don't remember people being this shocked and kind to one another since the Bali bombing. Have done my bit, along with every other Victorian I know. The ABC has put together a section on their website called How Can I Help? which lists what's needed by different places and is updated regularly.

On the craft front, I put together a small quilting panel that will probably be a carrybag one day. It's a 'whole cloth' thing - I'm not into making patchwork. So that was cheery. I put the layers together and have set about 10 stitches before dinner.

Plans are afoot on the financial front to rearrange things. This probably involves the sale of a second asset, the holding-on-like-grim-death to the third one which will be positively geared (or nearly). Time will tell.